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Counselors Explain Emotional Intelligence and 3 Ways to Use It

Emotional intelligence is a concept that has been on the rise for a couple of decades. But it has existed as an idea since the 1960s. It promotes the idea of an alternative intelligence to IQ, creating the idea that book smarts and socially normative views of intelligence may not be all there is to our brains and life.

So, what is emotional intelligence? Is it important? Is it necessary? Can it be built? Do you have it, and if you do, what can you do with it? And if you don’t, is that a bad thing? Read on to find out what emotional intelligence is and three ways to use it!

WHAT IS EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE?

Let’s look at the hallmarks that define this concept.

1.    DEFINING EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE

Emotional intelligence, often shortened to EQ or EI, refers to the ability to use, handle, perceive, manage, and understand different emotions. This idea applies to both yourself and others. Its use as a term surged in popularity in the mid-1990s. More recently, it has been touted as a highly positive and valid form of intelligence.

Someone with high EQ would presumably handle awkward situations, social environments, and interactions with others with grace. Someone with low EQ may struggle to understand why someone is sad, angry, or happy, even if the reasons seem perfectly obvious to others. This is a common experience of neurodivergent individuals who struggle with social cues or “normal” emotional affairs.

Having low EQ isn’t necessarily a bad thing. However, most people do want to increase their emotional intelligence. Indeed, there are many positive things that research has associated with high emotional intelligence, such as:

  • Better job performance
  • Improved leadership skills
  • Higher levels of positive thinking
  • Better mental health
  • Improved relationships
  • Positive influence over others

There has been a fair bit of controversy about emotional intelligence over the years, with questions about whether or not emotional intelligence is valid when compared to or used in tandem with the Big Five personality traits or standard IQ. Luckily, research has found that emotional intelligence maintains its validity even with those factors accounted for.

2.    COMPONENTS OF EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE

Emotional intelligence seems like a pretty abstract concept, but there’s more theory behind it than you may think. Experts have even been able to properly identify emotional intelligence features across different people, leading to what we know about the composition of EQ.

Daniel Goleman is credited with coining the term “emotional intelligence,” and his book about his research and theories on the subject identified five components of emotional intelligence. Here are those components:

·         SELF-REGULATION

Self-regulation allows you to take note of your emotional responses to things and ensure that they are appropriate and proportionate to the inciting incident. It means being aware of the consequences of your actions, being able to pause before deciding on behavior, and pushing yourself to bring out your own best.

·         EMPATHY

Emotional intelligence does have to make you focused on yourself and your actions, but that doesn’t mean it makes you self-centered. Those with high EQ can put themselves in the shoes of others and understand where they come from, even if they’ve never been in that situation before. You don’t judge people, using your own experiences as a guide.

·         SELF-AWARENESS

Being aware of your motivations, patterns, and thoughts is a crucial part of emotional intelligence. It allows you to be mindful of how your actions affect the world and the people around you, as well as yourself. You know what you feel, you know how to understand what you think and their triggers, and you’re under no illusions about your strengths and weaknesses.

·         SOCIAL SKILLS

You don’t need to be a social butterfly to have the social skills necessary for emotional intelligence. Mostly, this component means you can work with other people, are capable of conflict resolution, and develop positive communication techniques like active listening and welcoming body language. You would likely also know how to build relationships with others.

·         MOTIVATION

Emotional intelligence requires a degree of intrinsic motivation – a desire to do well and improve for yourself and your development. Your idea of success is defined by you and you alone, not by what other people try to push you into. You’re more likely to seek out goals that improve your personal growth over material goals, though there’s also nothing wrong with seeking material goals at the same time.

If you’re looking to build or increase your emotional intelligence, these are the five factors you’ll likely want to focus on improving the most. Although some people believe that emotional intelligence is innate and unchangeable, it can certainly be built and improved on, like any other skill or form of intelligence.

It is worth noting that – as is with all research and theories – there are some criticisms of Goleman’s explanation of these five components. As such, it is advised that you do some of your research or seek a professional opinion as you try to build your EQ!

Emotional_intelligence

THREE WAYS TO USE EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE

Here are three ways to put EI to work to improve your life.

1.    STOP BEING REACTIVE

It’s easy to immediately follow an impulse to react to the situations unfolding around you, whether they’re positive or negative. In cases of conflict, adverse events, or unexpected life changes, you may jump straight to a defensive mode instead of pausing to think about things.

You can use your emotional intelligence to control these impulses. Instead of reacting to things, respond to them. Use your knowledge of actions and consequences, your empathy skills, and mindfulness of your emotions to take a pause and think of how to respond to different situations.

The goal of any adverse event is to resolve it. While you can’t always tackle these events with positive thinking, you can certainly think about how to best move forward instead of simply reacting based on your emotions. With your EQ, you can consciously adjust your response to fit the situation and work towards solving problems instead of responding to them and accidentally exacerbating them in the process.

2.    LEARN ABOUT OTHERS

High emotional intelligence allows you to learn more about the people around you more quickly than those with low emotional intelligence. Better yet, the more you know about others, the more likely you are to develop even more emotional intelligence! Here are some ways to learn about others:

·         UNDERSTAND WHAT OTHERS WANT AND EXPECT

Different people are driven by different things and want other things out of their world and goals. Understanding those driving forces and desires is crucial to gaining a complete picture of the people around you. It can show you how to best communicate with, relate to, and appeal to those individuals. If you’re in a leadership position, this will also help you work better with your team and cooperate with those around you!

·         ASK ABOUT THEIR EXPERIENCES

Emotional intelligence can drive you to be genuinely curious about other people, their lives, and what they’ve been through. Use that to your advantage by showcasing your genuine interest and asking questions. Demonstrate that you’re genuinely interested in hearing about other people and what advice they have to share, and you’ll get to expand your horizons and impressively widen your worldview.

·         PRACTICE ACTIVE LISTENING

If you want to get people to talk to you, you have to show that you’re engaged, and emotional intelligence equips you with the ability to be! But that doesn’t mean you shouldn’t go the extra mile to make people feel heard. Use open body language, turn towards the people that speak, make good eye contact, and indicate your understanding.

3.    FOCUS ON “WE” INSTEAD OF “ME.”

As human beings, we’re all in the same boat – just trying to navigate life in the best way possible. Use emotional intelligence to keep that in mind as you go through your daily experiences and interact with the people around you.

When you connect to other people, it becomes evident that things aren’t really about you. Besides that, they’re certainly not about you versus them. Instead, there’s a collective sense that everyone in the world is in this life together.

People with low emotional intelligence may struggle to be there for other people or charitably view others because they consider their fate and life entirely isolated from those around them. Your EQ can remind you that this is not the case.

We’re all on a ship sailing through the tumultuous sea of life. If someone’s side of the ship gets damaged, you don’t shrug and say, “that’s your side, so I’m staying out of it.”  Instead, you recognize that we all need to work together and keep each other afloat and healthy. Otherwise, we all go down!

This is, of course, not to say that you should feel responsible for other people and their decisions. Instead, it is a reminder to use your emotional intelligence to form team-like bonds with others instead of competing with the people around you or judging them for their struggles.

Of course, this also goes for accepting criticism. Many people struggle to accept criticism in their lives. Don’t let that be you! You can learn so much from the feedback that the people around you provide, so don’t react to any constructive statements that sound bad at first. Put on your positive thinking, absorb what’s being said, and use that information to improve.

FINAL THOUGHTS ON SOME WAYS TO USE EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE

Emotional intelligence is a valuable tool, and it can make your life, interactions, and career better in many ways. It’s a great skill to build and showcase, and it can help you build stronger, healthier relationships with others and feel more fulfilled with your situation.

If you have low emotional intelligence, don’t feel discouraged! People can improve their emotional intelligence to some degree, at least on a cognitive level, and you certainly can, too.

If you struggle with some aspects of emotional intelligence, you can also communicate your difficulties with it; for example, difficulty comprehending social cues or emotions, as a symptom of neuro-divergence, is something that the people in your life can learn to accommodate.

The bottom line is that emotional intelligence, while necessary, doesn’t have to be something innate, and it’s okay if you have trouble with some of its components. Learning to work on the things you can change, especially with a therapist or similar professional, works wonders!

Lakeisha Ethans      August 13, 2021


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Positive People: The 3 Emotionally Intelligent Behaviors They Practice Daily

Engage negativity with the weapons of positivity.

There is simply no magic pill when it comes to becoming a more positive person. Everything behind what they do can be boiled down to one word: mindset.

To become more positive, especially in negative work environments that strip you of your joy and dignity, you have to engage the negative forces that surround you with three weapons of positivity.

1. Develop your self-awareness.

Self-awareness is a weapon used to protect you from yourself and your shortcomings. Remember to first inspect whether you’re the source of negative behavior. For example, are you a gossiper? If so, ask yourself three questions:

  •     How does it make me feel when I spread rumors?
  •     Why do I need to have this feeling?
  •     What does the behavior of talking bad behind someone’s back reveal to others about my own attitude?

This is where a boost of self-awareness does wonders. If you’re like most people bent on becoming more positive, you’ll probably gain some insight into how you are perceived when spreading gossip.

While getting to the core of your attitude and why it influences your behavior isn’t a cure-all solution, it’s a great first step to positivity. It also helps to expose the things that you’ve been hiding from yourself.

positivity

 

2. Break down your negative support systems.

Now that you’ve gained self-awareness, your next weapon is used to scan the landscape to determine what support systems are in place that reinforce negative attitudes and behaviors.

In the workplace, you’ll often find pockets of people and outdated management practices (like micromanagement or controlling behaviors) that often support and feed a toxic work culture.

Sticking with the theme of gossip, a willingness to actively participate in it and listen to circles of gossip is an example of how you may be feeding into the negative support system that fuels toxicity.

One weapon of positivity to counter this type of stronghold is to outright reject any association with negative forces that don’t promote the values of respect, trust, and accountability.

Plan to attack negative behaviors at the spot where they’re weakest. For example, if you really want to stop being around gossip, put limits on those who do it. Turn down lunch invitations from gossiping peers and co-workers, and walk away from sidebar and parking lot conversations that are beckoning to suck you into the negativity.

3. Have positive substitutes for negative behaviors.

Finally, replace those negative support systems with positive options that will deliver better results. We’re talking here about intentionally seeking out work relationships with positive people who share the very values that lead to healthy collaboration, safe work engagement, and energizing productivity.

You’ll know these positive people after a while; they’re the ones who have strict boundaries themselves and never get sucked into negativity. They think ahead about how to improve a bad situation, take accountability for their actions, and move toward contributing to solutions to organizational problems with positive intent.

By Marcel Schwantes    Principal and founder, Leadership From the Core     @MarcelSchwantes
source: www.inc.com


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5 Habits That All Emotionally Intelligent People Have In Common

What does it really mean to be emotionally intelligent? Many of us can say we’re in touch with our emotions but how does this translate into a relatable and social intelligence towards ourselves and other people?

The idea is that emotional intelligence is not only recognising and identifying with our own emotions, but also having the capacity to handle other people’s feelings in an empathetic and astute way. This is a crucial way to build long, lasting relationships with those around us while managing our own emotions in a healthy manner.

With this in mind, here are 5 habits that are identifiable with an emotionally intelligent person.

1. They Know Asking For Help Is A Strength Not A Weakness

Emotional intelligence is essentially down to a sense of self-confidence. While many people feel asking for help is a sign of weakness, it’s really just a mindset of insecurity and potential judgement of others.

Someone who possess emotional intelligence knows that they have an understanding of their own strengths and limitations. They understand that while having self-confidence, they realise that they don’t necessarily know everything there is to know and aren’t afraid to admit this. Sourcing information to bridge the information gap and collaborating with others is seen as a strength and a chance to grow as a person rather than a weakness.

2. They Are Able To Deal With Communication Problems In A Calm Way

When we are having communication problems with people—whether loved ones, colleagues or even strangers—it can be frustrating, leading to lashing out or losing our cool. Being able to stay calm and patient when facing communication challenges is a sure sign of emotional intelligence.

The ability to read social cues is key. Calmly being able to redirect or pivot the approach of their message when it clearly isn’t getting across is showing empathy towards the needs of their audience. They care, not only about the message they’re trying to convey, but about other people having a clear understanding.

embrace_failure

 

3. They Are Able To Discuss Conflict Clearly And Objectively

Arguments can bring out the worst in people and bring up difficult emotions. It can cause feelings of frustration, feeling like you’re not being understood and goes against our need to be accepted and always right.

With emotional intelligence comes the need to be understood without being patronising, condescending or angry. It’s the ability to explain a conflict in a clear and objective way. Emotionally intelligent people have self-awareness of their own emotions, they are able to self-manage these emotions, be empathetic towards where other people are coming from in their argument, and be good at handling the others’ emotions too.

4. They Are Able To Deal With Negative Feedback In A Positive Way

While getting negative feedback can bring out our insecurities, emotionally intelligent people are able to deal with it self-confidently without getting defensive.

Focusing on the facts and keeping a level head allows their emotions to stay in check meaning they are more likely to see criticism as growth rather than damage to their self-worth. This isn’t to say emotionally intelligent people don’t experience negative emotions such as frustration when hearing criticism, but they are able to process them quickly and climb out of their own perspective to meet someone else’s.

5. They Are Able To Embrace Failure

Self-confidence is key when it comes to dealing with setbacks. The importance of self-confidence is that it will keep you afloat when life throws you into the deep-end and emotionally intelligent people know this.

Having this self-confidence is how emotionally intelligent people deal with failures. They realise that assessing troubling situations in an objective way without harsh self-judgement and lashing out is paramount to picking themselves up, gaining strength, taking on board what they’ve learnt from the situation and moving on.

Conclusion

Learning more about our emotions and those of others can propel us far in life. Being more stable in our thoughts and perspectives can get us through hard situations and build more lasting relationships with others and ourselves.

Jenny Marchal      Freelance Writer
 


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Why We Need to Teach Kids Emotional Intelligence

For years, I’ve taught a weekly psychology class to students ranging from 7 to 14 years-old. In this class, I encourage self-reflection, asking kids to identify and express what they think and feel and to consider the thoughts and feelings of others. The results are often surprising. Strong, self-aware statements come out of their mouths that I don’t always expect. “I feel bad about myself in class. I worry I’ll be slower than everyone else.” “I’m angry when my dad won’t take time to help me with my homework. It makes me not want to try anymore.” “I hate it when my friends don’t want to play with me. So, I yell, but that just makes it worse.”

Too often, we tend to think of our kids as less sophisticated and incapable of processing or understanding the emotional complexities of their world. We think we’re protecting them by not bringing up the trickier, less pleasant subjects. But I can tell you firsthand that kids absorb a tremendous amount. Pretty much as soon as they’re verbal, children can be taught to identify and communicate their feelings. In a trusted environment where emotions are talked about openly, most kids will speak freely about their feelings and are quick to have empathy for their peers.

With their brains growing at a rapid rate, all children are constantly noticing, reacting, adapting and developing ideas based on their emotional experiences. This leaves me to wonder why we give our child an education in so many subjects, teaching them to sound out words and brush their teeth, and yet we fail to equip them with an emotional education that can dramatically improve the quality of their lives.

When you teach kids emotional intelligence, how to recognize their feelings, understand where they come from and learn how to deal with them, you teach them the most essential skills for their success in life. Research has shown that emotional intelligence or EQ “predicts over 54% of the variation in success (relationships, effectiveness, health, quality of life).” Additional data concludes that “young people with high EQ earn higher grades, stay in school, and make healthier choices.”

At this year’s Wisdom 2.0, I felt inspired by a talk by Dr. Marc Brackett, the Director of the Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence, who talked at length about the importance of teaching kids to know their emotions. The Center has developed the RULER program for schools. RULER is an acronym that stands for Recognizing emotions in self and others,Understanding the causes and consequences of emotions, Labeling emotions accurately, Expressing emotions appropriately and Regulating emotions effectively. The program has been shown to boost student’s emotional intelligence and social skills, productivity, academic performance, leadership skills and attention, while reducing anxiety, depression and instances of bullying between students. RULER creates an all-around positive environment for both students and teachers, with less burnout on both ends.

ruler

These five RULER principles run parallel in many ways to social intelligence pioneer and author of Emotional Intelligence: Why it Can Matter More than IQ, Daniel Goleman’s five components of emotional intelligence. You can see how each of these elements would contribute to an individual’s personal success and sense of well-being.

  • Self-awareness. Knowing our own emotions.
  • Self-regulation. Being able to regulate and control how we react to our emotions.
  • Internal motivation.  Having a sense of what’s important in life.
  • Empathy. Understanding the emotions of others.
  • Social skills. Being able to build social connections.

As parents, when we don’t have a healthy way of handling emotions ourselves, we have trouble teaching our kids to handle theirs. That is why the change starts with us. Fortunately, all five components of emotional intelligence can be taught and learned at any age. There are many tools and techniques that can help us and our children start to identify and understand the emotions of ourselves and others. This process begins with recognition, because it’s only when we notice where we’re at that we’re able to shift ourselves to where we want to be.

When we acknowledge the profound influence of emotions in our lives, we inspire a new attitude toward self-awareness and mental health. We can then start to ask broader questions, like how can we create a movement to increase the emotional intelligence of future generations?

One place to start is with mindfulness. Studies have found that a mindfulness  practice can help reduce symptoms of stress, depression and anxiety in children. It can also increase gray matter density in regions of the brain involved in emotional regulation. Another study  of adolescents found that yoga, which can increase mindfulness, helped improve student’s emotional regulation capacity.

On a systemic level, we can help raise the emotional intelligence of future generations by working together to get our schools to implement programs like RULER. On a face-to-face level, as parents, teachers, friends and caretakers, we can open up a dialogue and encourage kids to express what they’re feeling. We can teach them what co-author of Parenting from the Inside Out Dr. Daniel Siegel often refers to as “name it to tame it,” in which children learn that naming their feelings can help them get a hold on them. We can also talk more about our own feelings, being honest and direct about the times when we feel sad, angry or even afraid.

When we mess up or act out with or around our children, instead of trying to sweep it under the rug, we should acknowledge what occurred in us and repair any emotional damage we may have caused. In taking these each of these steps, we create an environment in which our children can continually make sense of their emotions and experiences. This skill set is perhaps the largest predictor of not only their success in life, but more importantly, their happiness.


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Leveling Up Your Emotional Intelligence

Moving from reaction to response to reflection

One of the hallmarks of emotional intelligence is the ability to respond to a situation, rather than react to it. We are at our basest when we react to external situations or events, allowing those experiences to control our behavior. Through the development of self-awareness, we move away from this external orientation toward one that is more interior in nature. As this happens, we become more and more cognizant of our thoughts and feelings, giving us increasing access to our interior landscape.

When we react, we are literally being hijacked by our emotions, or, more to the point, overwhelmed by a physio-emotional response driven by a brain structure called the amygdala. The amygdalae (pl.) are two almond shaped nuclei—a cluster of densely packed neurons—located medially in the temporal lobes of the brain. It is one of the more thoroughly understood regions of the brain, particularly with regard to gender differences. Research shows it to be integral to memory, decision-making and, most importantly for this conversation, emotional reactions.

As we mature, moving away from a purely exterior orientation to one that is more interior and balanced, we begin to lay the foundation of emotional regulation. That’s not to say we can’t fall back into reacting to external stimuli. When we do, however, we are more likely to be aware of what’s going on for us, rather than just having a tantrum in the face of not getting our needs or expectations met.

This self-awareness leads us to other-awareness. In other words, we begin to develop sympathy in its truest sense—a commonality of feeling—with others. With this in hand, we are open to developing empathy, where we are not simply sharing feelings with others, but understanding their experience. The resonance created by this understanding and attendant empathy is at the heart of moving from reacting to responding.

compassion

When we are in this matrix of sympathy, empathy and understanding, we are not only with our own feelings, but with the feelings of another person. When that connection extends beyond a single person to a group or the larger community, we move out of the egocentricity of empathy and into the ethno- and geo-centricity of compassion. Exercising compassion demands that we stay inside. By staying inside, and not letting ourselves get pulled off center by the situations or events outside us, we move into an even more subtle level of emotional intelligence—from responding to reflecting.

Exercising compassion means holding space. Reflection, on the other hand, is about holding the space. The subtle difference here is that holding space, from the perspective of Buddhist psychology, is about accepting and allowing for the experience of another person—being with it and being with them. Holding the space, by contrast, means holding the container of experience and staying centered in it so the accepting and allowing of compassion can happen. The former—holding space—is an expression of witnessing the emotional experience of an individual or community. The latter—holding the space—extends beyond witnessing into active participation. Reflection transforms compassionate understanding into an act of authentic tenderness and humanity that raises not only our own level of emotional intelligence, but weaves that ethos into the larger fabric of society, hopefully for the greater good.

Jul 31, 2016  
Michael J Formica MS, MA, EdM


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Emotional Intelligence Isn’t A Philosophy, It’s A Fundamental Part Of Survival

BY MAZWI TYSON ZONDI

In a world that encourages shallowness and consumerism (which aren’t as far apart as one might think) we need to be able to develop emotional intelligence. We need to realize that it is just as important as mental (and other forms) of intelligence, if not more so.

People have all these misconceptions about emotional intelligence: they believe that it is dismissing every negative emotion and choosing only to feel positive- whereas doing this is near impossible to do.

Either that, or they believe it is dismissing emotion altogether, and living in a constant neutral state. This is even more dangerous, as suppressed feelings always find a way to come to the forefront. And not always in the best way.

Emotional intelligence, really, is about knowing our emotions, and listening to whatever said emotions call us to do.

Emotions aren’t enemies to be silenced. They never were. They are only signals to show us how we interpret a given situation, and it is up to us to learn how to manage those signals so that they can lead us to fulfilling, happy lives.

Emotional intelligence has not developed as we have. When we weren’t as highly actualized beings, we knew that fear meant to run, and pain meant to be present, and so on. Our emotions evolved, but our minds haven’t caught up yet.

emotional intelligence

We don’t know what to do with complex feelings – how to interpret them, how to respond. So we don’t know how to ensure our survival in 2016. We may not be running from lions, but now we’re at risk of running from ourselves.

In gaining emotional intelligence, you learn that the manner in which you are in tune with your emotions = how you are able to manage your life.

Communication skills seem to be in abundance for those with high levels of emotional intelligence. This makes sense, seeing as how communication is, by far, the most common trait in successful relationships (romantic, or otherwise).

Speaking of relationships, knowing yourself emotionally changes your perspective on how to get to a successful long-term relationship. You realize that a relationship that is worth giving your time, attention and emotional availability to isn’t just found. It is built. It is cultivated. It is made.

And the most important relationship of them all?

The relationship you have with yourself.

You see the importance of knowing oneself; to have a sense of self-awareness. And so you go on walks, meditate, read, journal, and take personality-type tests in order to better understand yourself. To be able to live a life where anger, sadness and fear aren’t to be avoided at all costs, but to be felt and used for our benefit.

All in all, emotional intelligence is probably the closest thing humanity has to life intelligence.